Show Journal 1997-07-23
Its official … EJ’s rules. Every time we play there or go see a show it always is good. We finally got to play with Bomf! We had been to see them a few times before and were excited about it. Bomf! is now on tour. Go see them. They are great. They are on tour with The Leeches who are so cool they even have a song about farm animals.
Show Journal 1997-07-18
There wasn’t too much to say about this show. 5 bands in 3 hours made for a lot of music. The Kankor Sores were pretty burly, and the Knuckleheads had a pretty good show as well. It seemed like everyone there knew their songs. As for us, we played first so it wasn’t too much to tell. In fact, when the sound guy told us to go ahead and start there were only 2 people there. Of course, they all started to roll in during the end of our set. It didn’t matter though, because we couldn’t see a thing with the cool ‘stage lights.’
Show Journal 1997-07-16
Marty’s Garage is literally a garage attached to Marty’s house and a surprisingly cool place to play. They just open the doors to the garage and the bands play inside. Aside from a cool place to play people there seem to know an awful lot about wrestling. A band called Brody played after us and they were really darn good. Go see them if they play near you. They were from Philadelphia and seemed really nice. Anyway, thanks Marty.
Show Journal 1997-07-07
Monday night … 11:00 … do you know where your kids are? Well they weren’t at our show. I think everyone in town went to see Face to Face. No, actually it was free band night at Satyricon and the turnout was surprisingly good. A lot of people heard us from the bar or outside and came in to see us. I think tonight’s highlight was Bryan bashing through one of his toms in the middle of our set. This was almost eclipsed by seeing a genuine pimp coming out of a nearby building after the show.
Show Journal 1997-07-01
Man I thought this show was gonna suck. There was hardly anyone there, it was a tuesday night, and the headlining band bumped us to play last just so they could get back home early. This was all after we agreed to give them all of the door money. Thankfully, people stuck around through their whole set, so by the time we started there were between 30-40 really bored looking people. But once we started everyone seemed to wake back up. After a few songs and a bunch of Macho Man jokes things started to rock. It got pretty wacky, people throwing chairs, dancing on other people’s backs, pile-on’s and the occasional “clear out a circle and lets breakdance” session. It was the most fun I’ve had playing in a long time. A couple of people thanked us after the show, saying how glad they were that someone from Portland was finally into playing all ages shows. Oh by the way, Phill Wanted still rocks.
Show Journal 1997-06-29
Another pretty cool show in Portland. It was an all ages show with 3 other bands. Short Round from Eugene was awesome. It was Phill Wanted’s first show and they rocked hard. One of these days they are going to rule this town. We play again with them in 2 days which should be fun. We unveiled the Volvo song at this show and it went over well. The sound guy said we were the loudest band he’s heard in a while. There were girls in the front covering their ears which left us with an oddly enjoyable feeling. Someone said we were good musicians … that was pretty cool. Wrong, but pretty cool. One crappy thing happened that I’m dying to mention. Two of Dave’s friends showed up to see us and were told that they couldn’t come in because “dressed appropriately to see a show here.” If someone is willing to show up on a Sunday afternoon and pay 5 bucks to see some local bands, should it matter what they are wearing? I guess I didn’t realize there was a fashion show going on.
Show Journal 1997-06-15
Hello Portland. This was our first show as a 3 piece and it rocked. The people there really seemed to get into all of the bands, which was nice. A welcome change from days past in a different time zone. Usually with 6 bands for a buck everyone just drinks beer and works the bar, but people actually paid attention. Most of the other bands were pretty good. Some worth a mention were Super Villain, Beer Gut, Ladies Speed Stik and Witch Throttlegush. I think we won the crowd over when Bryan shared his tale of meeting Dio in a record store.
Show Journal 1996-12-10
(Added Oct. 2001) – This was the last 800 Octane show in Boone before we all headed off to Portland. I didn’t get to play this one and gladly relinquished the honor to Greg who had been filling in for me at practices and shows throughout the year. Since it was a somewhat special occasion for our band everyone dressed in costumes. Dave dressed up as Elvis, Greg was an Insane Clown, and Bryan in typical Bryan fashion opted to dress up a Bruce Jenner. I can’t recall what Paul dressed up as. Does anyone remember? Looking back this was the end of a lot of things. This was Paul’s last show in the band and well as the end of Greg’s filling in on guitar. We didn’t know it at the time it was the end of our old sound. The following month we moved to Portland as a 3 piece and have never sounded the same since. What’s really funny is that we had about 30-40 good solid songs and I think we currently only play 2 or 3 those any more. Amazing how quickly things can change.
Show Journal 1996-09-27
(Added Oct. 2001) – I recall this show being kind of lame. Probably because I had commuted from Chicago to play it. Go figure. The ASU Pub was always good, but never great. I do remember Paul playing his new guitar at this show.
Show Journal 1996-08-29
(Added Oct. 2001) – What’s interesting about this show is that The Drapes were from Portland and eventually became the Blue Ribbon Boys who Jim played drums for! Small world sometimes.
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